I took another sip of the tart, intoxicating drink. “If we’re on a clock, I would imagine my ability to shoot an arrow is more important than… this.”
“Nothing is more important than this.” He steepled his fingers on the desk, leaning forward. “The history of this kingdom, the politics—the reason you’re fighting for your life. Don’t you want to know it?”
That insistence on knowledge.Just like Elisabet.
I dropped the napkin and rose, crossing to his desk and taking the seat opposite his. “Of course I want to know it. But I’d rather know how to kill a man than why he was born with six fingers.”
“Why not learn about both?” He lifted a book almost as wide as my palm. “We’ll start here. The four courts of Feyreign.”
The cover thudded as he set it down, and something in my chest answered with a thud of its own.
For the nexthour we sat in the two facing armchairs while I learned of Feyreign, a kingdom divided into four courts: Sylvanwild, Noctere, Aurelia, and Highmark. Each had a queen, and only one court ruled all of Feyreign at any time. Once a century the trials would determine their champions to fight for each queen, and those champions would fight to secure their court’s rule.
The queens themselves did not fight. A court losing its queen represented a terrible loss. The fae who became queen were the strongest, the most capable of their court. So only the young were chosen, fae just grown. The young were always easier to cull for a kingdom.
Dorian’s words came back to me then, with more clarity:Fucking pomp and dominance. Queens and diadems and whose boot rests on whose neck.
Now I understood. And I agreed with him.
A ruler should fight their own battles.
“But why place women in the trials, then?” I asked. “If women have the greater connection to magic, then why not just have the young men fight amongst themselves?”
“The trials aren’t just a proving ground for queens,” Dorian said. “Victorious champions are assets to their courts. If you were queen, wouldn’t you want such a champion serving you for life?”
“Not this way,” I said, and meant it.
Dorian chuckled. “Very well. Let’s move on to magic, shall we?”
Magic. The great equalizer. I knew now that fae women had the greatest connection to nature—to magic. They werephysically smaller than the men, yes, but nothing was more deadly, more powerful than the harnessing of magic.
The moment I learned of it, I yearned for it.
I sat forward, the thrill of this conversation bright in my chest. “I have yet to seemagic.”
“It’s this.” Dorian raised one hand and snapped his fingers. A wash of air blew through my hair, and then blue-white sparks like a flint on stone shot from his middle finger and thumb.
I stared, eyes round. That was what I had seen in the forest—what I had felt the first time I’d entered this kingdom. “That’s…”
He lowered his hand. “A court trick.”
“Can you do more?”
“Yes.”
“Do it, then.”
He shook his head. “What matters is that what you just saw is a pale imitation of what Rhiannon is capable of.”
I leaned forward, fingers touching the table. “What is she capable of?”
His eyes glazed, seeing past me for a flash. Then they sharpened on me. “I should hope you’ll never know. But when she gives an order, you obey.”
He’d said that last part once before. It sounded like deep history packed into one sharp-tongued sentence.
My eyes narrowed, unwilling realization dawning. “When you attacked my kingdom—those green flashes in the sky…”
He stared back, face a mask.
